World champion James Gibson was eliminated in a duel with fellow Briton Chris Cook in the heats of the men's 50 metres breaststroke at the European short-course swimming championships at Abbotstown this morning.
Gibson, who won the 100 metres title yesterday, and Cook clocked an identical time in the heats and had to swim off for the second British place in the evening's semi-finals.
Darren Mew, bronze medallist to Gibson's gold in the 100 breaststroke, touched third in his heat in 27.44, which proved quicker than Gibson and Cook, who tied for first place in the last heat in 27.54.
With only two from a single country allowed to progress to the semi-finals and finals, that meant Gibson - the world long-course and Commonwealth champion - and Cook had to swim off for a spot in the 16-strong semi-finals. Cook prevailed in 27.27, with Gibson touching in 27.53.
Sweden's Stefan Nystrand, who lost his 50 metres freestyle crown to Britain's Mark Foster on Thursday, revealed a new talent as a breaststroke swimmer, clocking the morning's fastest time of 27.20. Two Britons - double Commonwealth champion Sarah Price and world long-course 200 backstroke gold medallist Katy Sexton - also returned the same time in the women's 50 metres backstroke heats but they were their nation's fastest pair and both went through to the semi-finals.
Price and Sexton clocked 28.66 in separate heats, which left them joint eighth overall with Hungarian Nikolett Szepesi, who achieved the same time. Defending champion Antje Buschschulte, who retained her 100 backstroke title on Friday, was second-fastest on aggregate in 28.10, a mere 0.01 seconds slower than fellow German Janine Pietsch.
Triple world champion Hannah Stockbauer of Germany, a distant sixth in Friday's 800 metres freestyle, continued her lacklustre run when she failed to qualify for the 400 freestyle final, finishing 13th overall in the heats. Britain's Rebecca Cooke was the fastest in four minutes 06.06 seconds.
German Sarah Poewe, winner of Thursday's 50 breaststroke final, set a championship record of 1:06.43 in leading qualifiers for the women's 100 breaststroke semi-finals.